Archive for the 'Resources' Category

Doing Chores

Published
by
Zach Mayer
on July 18, 2008
in Community, Dialogue, Partnerships and Resources
. 4 Comments

Hopefully we all take some pride in where we live. I mean our homes, where we lay our heads down for rest, where we spend time with our family, where we eat and find shelter. Our homes can be a reflection of who we are. Some of us own our homes, others rent, some may have just a room to call home. Whatever the case, keeping that space requires care. You pick things up, put things away, take things out as you come and go, because you want to maintain your home in order to live in it.

We also have a community home, in the sense of an actual space, which includes our public meeting places at Broad and Washington and East. Here is where we interact as a community on an on-going basis. Many of us have made a commitment, a covenant, to call this our community home. A place to worship, find joy, learn to love and to do this with many different kinds of people. As we do this we create a place similar to home where we come and go, bring things in and take stuff away. There is wear and tear and we do our best to maintain the space and take pride in where we are living.

Here, I think of the analogy of doing chores as a kid. Occasionally, I had to paint a room, cut the lawn, stack firewood or others big jobs during summer break. And more consistently, I had to sweep the stairs, clean my room, do the dishes, and take care of the other daily messes that occurred. My parents often had to keep on me to do these things and sometimes had to bribe me, but in the end these things had to be done. And doing them gave me a strong sense of ownership and respect for my home.

Our communal home, the spaces at Circle of Hope that we all use, should be regarded similarly. We are all God’s children. We have been blessed with a place to call home and there will be chores to do in the course of living there. What do you do that influences our home at Circle? If you show up, it’s bound to be a reflection, in some part, of who you are. We should all be thinking about it as a home and wondering how we keep it looking and feeling like that. Because we live there, we will always be cleaning up messes, fixing doors, hanging pictures, maintaining offices and equipment. So, decide what kind of “chores” you need to do this month to care for our home at Circle.

Living Together

Published
by
Tricia Fussaro
on June 16, 2008
in Community, Dialogue and Resources
. 5 Comments

I’ve been thinking about sharing recently. I suppose not entirely unusual for a kindergarten teacher. It’s practically my job to teach people how to share. This week I witnessed an interesting interaction. During free time, four of my students chose to work with our pattern blocks. Blue rhombuses, red trapezoids, yellow hexagons, orange squares, green triangles, each student may take one box to use and be responsible for returning. All four students grabbed their box and headed to the same table where they could work together. Three of those students immediately took their boxes and dumped them all together in the middle of the table. They began to discuss how much they had to work with and what they would create today. Those three also noticed one student still had all his pattern blocks in his box. They discussed the situation with him. “Put yours into the pile too. Look how much we’ve got! If you put yours in we’ll all have even more.” He looked back at the three not quite sure how he felt.

I find that kindergarten children are often very good at teaching me the life lessons I need to be learning. I have heard this invitation from time to time as well. Join in! Together we accomplish more. Take your pick. I’m sure you’ve heard the cry as well, perhaps in different ways throughout your life. Sometimes I’ve learned to jump right in. Other times, just as this little guy is with his pattern blocks, I’m hesitant.

This time the question has been floating around in my mind about living in community. When Adam and I first got married we were introduced to the idea of living together with other folks, sharing a living space, money, food, and responsibility. Sure, I had seen young, single people live together. It made sense to me. But once you were married you lived on your own. That was my idea of the way it went. The idea of families cohabitating sounded overwhelming. I knew lots of families who had trouble getting along and living together. Adding more people into the equation seemed like asking for trouble. Over the next few years I watched folks who were doing it. I decided to get my feet wet. We invited some single folks to live with us for a period, try it out for a bit.

Now our housemates have moved out. You know what? I miss them. I have loved living with people. It’s been a wonderful blessing. In the meantime, we’ve met this wonderful couple. They have two wonderful, beautiful little girls we adore. Over the last year their housing situation has been transitional. Adam and I have also been thinking about what is next for us. We’re just ready to look for a house and move. We found this wonderful house we love… With a yard! Imagine such a thing. It has grass. I can plant in the ground! This house is big. We’re talking six bedrooms. And it’s only the two of us. We share one bedroom. It’s big enough to share.

So, we asked them to move into this house with us. Live together. Share money, food, responsibility, and care for one another. They agreed. I am so excited, and SO scared. I know this is going to be hard. I haven’t lived with kids since I was one. And we don’t all know each other nearly as well as we knew the other folks we asked to lived with us. So it will be hard. All the best things I’ve ever done have been hard. I trust this will be no different. So I’m throwing myself in.

He threw his into the pile as well. The pattern blocks. He thought for a minute or two and saw all there was to be gained. The abundance of pattern blocks and fun and all the possibilities of what they could do together with all they had collectively. How about you? Where can you join in with what you have to add?

responding to God

Published
by
Joshua
on May 30, 2008
in Action, Community, Dialogue, Family, Peace and Resources
. 2 Comments

‘ve been trying to keep up with my daily dose of Brennan Manning since my friend Kim gave me a copy of The Ragamuffin Gospel:  Good News for the Bedraggled, Burnt Out, and Beat Up.
Today I read an insight of his that casts some light on what I think a lot of us are working through this season:  trying to do enough, or the other side-feeling bad about not trying enough.

“American spirituality still seems to start with self, not with God.  Personal responsibility replaces personal response…The emphasis is always on what I do rather than on what God is doing in my life.  In this macho approach God is reduced to a benign old spectator on the sidelines…We become convinced that we can do a pretty good job of following Jesus if we just, once and for all, make up our minds and really buckle down to do it.”

How freeing it is, indeed, to not put off letting Jesus work until we have it all put together.  I can think of a million reasons why I’m not firing on all cylinders right now-and if I can only___________ than I’ll get right with Jesus.

We can almost instinctively talk about our debt, having small kids, not kicking our bad habits, our living situation, our poor diet, or lack of exercise as if they are God’s major barriers-not just our struggles or limitations.  Let’s own the limitations as ours (not God’s), and let our redemption come from Christ (not us).

Jesus works beyond circumstance.  If you’re having a hard time right now, that’s okay.  We all do, we’re not there yet.  Rather than overly dwelling on limitations we can own them/admit them, let Jesus in, and follow him on to new life.

I think Christ has a lot to say about it beyond our circumstance/need/limitations/sin/brokenness/struggle.  How are you responding to what Jesus is doing  in you?  How are you responding to what Jesus is doing in your cell?  How are we responding to what Jesus is doing in theWhat is Jesus trying to do in you?  What is Jesus doing in your cell?  What is Jesus going to do in the megalopolis?